depression strikes again.

this time i know exactly what caused it. exactly. a phone conversation in the wee hours of the morning with someone very close to me. [no, not my army boy... i wish i could talk to him on the phone in the wee hours of the morning... with all my heart i wish it... even if not a whole lot of actual talking would take place *wink wink*] what was so depressing about the conversation? well... thats a tough one to explain. i dont even fully understand it myself. but things were said; things that hurt me horribly. its funny how someone can have good intentions, and still wind up emotionally disembowling you... and i know he didnt mean to hurt me like that... i know he didnt mean to throw me into this black hole of depression... i know he didnt mean to make me cry... i know he didnt mean to make me feel like complete and total shit...

but he did.

[disclaimer: i have more male friends than i do female, and of my female friends, i only have one that i talk to about anything important. my guy friends are my confidants. generally i get along better with them then i do with women. i think its the sexual tension that screws up my friendships with women... which is not as big a deal with guy friends, cuz sexual tension is expected... ya know? eh. if ya dont, its okay... i'm not sure i do either]

we ended up basically hanging up on eachother... i guess i pissed him off too. i understand. i have a tendency to frustrate the hell out of people. its not that i do it on purpose, its just how i am. i see things differently than most. i feel things differently than most. i have weird hang ups, and strange boundaries. it takes a special kind of person to be able to put up with me. it takes an even more special kind of person to enjoy me.

the problem is, this friend wants me to be different than how i am. i dont blame him. i'd like me to be different than how i am. but... pushing me to change, will not effect that change any quicker. its something that i have to do, myself, on my own terms, on my own timeline. if he wants to help, fine, but again, its got to be on my terms, on my timeline.

my terms:

what doesnt help me:
complaining about the issues i have does not help me.
getting mad at me for the issues i have does not help me.
bitching at me about the issues i have does not help me.
making me feel guilty about the issues i have does not help me.
making me feel inept and inadequate because of the issues i have does not help me.
pushing me to move forward when i'm not ready to does not help me.
telling me that i'm doing this to myself does not help me.

what does help me:
being patient with me helps me.
holding my hand helps me.
being there when i need you to be helps me.
being gentle with me helps me.
accepting me the way i am helps me.
accepting the fact that i'm doing the best i can helps me.
giving me a shoulder to cry on helps me.
letting me vent helps me.
rambling on about nothing in particular when i cant think of anything to say helps me.
telling me that everything will be alright (and meaning it) helps me.
reminding me that i'm not alone helps me.
"playing that game" helps me.
making me smile and laugh helps me.

that said... we'll see.
i'm going home now... nytol.

i have been remiss...

i realize that i have been remiss in posting... but i've got a good reason. and no, work is not it. hehe.

i ended up staying home yesterday... and as i was lying on my couch watching tv, wondering when oh when would i stop being in hellishly excruciating pain, and seriously debating getting a sex change, my new laptop showed up! i'm glad i stayed home, or i would have missed the guy, and had to wait another day or two to get it! let me just say, after that point, i rather forgot that i was in such extreme discomfort, and immediately set about configuring my beautiful wonderful new computer.

i had techie-gasms all afternoon [yeah, you read that right, techie-gasms. what of it? i have pen-gasms and stationary-gasms when i go to office supply stores too! ugh... shush up... stop laughing at me!], and late into the evening, playing with my new toy... exploring it, probing it, rearranging it, and testing it out.

its a dell inspiron 1000, 2.2 ghz intel celeron processor, 512 mb ram, 60 gb hard drive, 15" screen, integrated networking card, pcmcia 802.11b/g wireless card, dvd-cd r/w... and came with word perfect office 12, paint shop pro 8, and a bunch of other various software.

i am having a torrid love affair with it. [i appologize whole heartedly... but i couldnt resist... i have fallen hopelessly, madly, in love with my laptop... what can i say, i'm an uber geek at heart *shrug*]

i only have 3 problems with it.

1) it runs microshaft windoze X-Puke as an operating system. in my opinion, that is the worst platform ever created... and bill gates should be drawn and quartered for daring to market such a complete and utter piece of crap to us. [for those of you unfamiliar with the derogatory slang i have just used... microshaft = microsoft, windoze = windows, X-Puke = XP] X-Puke isnt compatible with hardware that i currently own, and it isnt compatible with software that i currently own, therefore making my investments in those rather worthless.

[rant about microshaft: gotta love the money making scheme microshaft has going there... i can see it now:

bill gates: lets make a new OS platform.
minions: yes master!
bill: now, how do we make it even more profitable than the last one?
minions: you know all master, enlighten us! instruct us in your evil ways!
bill: i know... we'll make it incompatible with just about everything thats currently out on the market!
minions: oh great overlord, how will that make it more profitable??
bill: it will make it more profitable, because it will only run software, and be compatible with hardware, that we authorize. people will have to throw out all their old software and hardware, and go buy it new again, from us!!
minions (prostrating themselves): oooooooooooohhhhhh! aaaahhhhhhh! we are awed by your malfeasance!

what, you dont think that bill gates is the embodiment of all evil? damn, he's gotten to you too... *holds up hands in front of her face, fingers forming a cross* get thee behind me, satan!! *tosses holy water at you* hmmm that didnt work.... oh... thats vampires. oh well. nevermind, i guess.]

2) my new laptop does not have a floppy drive. why is this a problem? well, my old lap top does not have a cd burner. so... um... how is it exactly that i'm going to be transferring my files from my old computer to my new one? i have four options. a) i can go buy the $40 software from dell to transfer my files. b) i can email all my files to myself in small batches. c) i can sync the two laptops together via usb or ethernet connection and transfer the files that way... if i can figure out how to do it, and what hardware i need to do so. d) i can hand the old computer over to my ex and let him burn everything to cd for me [this is the option i'm taking since he knows how to do it, and can do it easily. in fact, i think he's doing it tonight.]

3) i cannot seem to get my webcam set up. [oh big whoop right? well hey! its the only way my army boy gets to see me right now, not to mention a few other choice friends of mine that dont get to see me any other way either. its for their benefit, not mine! and i'm all about pleasing people, so damned straight i wanna get that thing hooked up!]. part of the problem is that i lost the stupid disc somewhere, and i cant find it. and the website for the manufacturer doesnt have the full software for download either. all it had were the driver updates [updates are NOT the same as the full software. *sigh*]. and thanks to item 1 [see microshaft rant], the full drivers are not available from microshaft, so i cant get them that way. i've had to resort to having my ex burn me a copy of his neice's software [same camera we think, same manufacturer anyway, and it seems to list all the webcams on that particular disc so we'll see if it actually works out or not] so i can try that route. if it doesnt work... i'll have to contact the manufacturer and see if they'll send me a duplicate copy *sigh*

other than that, i'm more than happy with the thing. it came with word perfect office 12... omg. all you people who badmouth word perfect have obviously not used the most recent version because WOW! and i'm ultra picky about my word processing programs! wp gives you so many different options... and tutorials... and its ultra user friendly... [what about compatability you ask? what about the fact that everyone else in the world uses MS Office? WELL!! let me tell you... WP not only will compose, and save, in WP format, but it also composes and saves in MS Word format. AND it will convert existing docs to WP, Word or PDF at the click of a button! PLUS it has options to compose in "legal mode" which is very cool.] so! there! word perfect haters, take that! i will hear no more ill from you poor pathetic microshaft brain washed fools!!

and on that note, i am off to carry my brand new, shiny, beautiful, wonderful, amazing laptop to my business class!

day dreaming of rainy afternoons...

day dreaming of rainy afternoons spent curled up on the couch, in his arms, just listening to the rain hammer away outside.

day dreaming of standing in the doorway to the balcony his arms around me, my arms around him, watching the rain wash the world clean.

day dreaming of long walks in the rain, stopping to kiss on street corners, where everyone can see how much in love we are, laughing as people stare and give us "get a room" looks.

day dreaming of coming home, still laughing, and stripping each others wet clothes off, then falling into bed together and spending the rest of the day there, making love.

day dreaming of tickle fights, and play wrestling, ending in kisses and caresses.

day dreaming of his mouth on mine, on my neck, on my shoulders, then lower... and lower... ummm *blush*

imma go back to the day dreaming now... *grin*

good morning world... i think.

i was thrown into the working world full force this morning, without my normal 2 hours of goofing off to wake me up, so i'm really not sure that i did what i was supposed to do correctly... sorry, but thats what happens when i'm required to show up before 9, and "emergencies" are immediately dropped in my lap. i hold no remorse for any errors that may occur. its simply not my fault. its the fault of management for not letting me work later hours. [thats my story, and i'm sticking to it].

suffice it so say that i'm uber tired, but i'm once again in one of those strangely relaxed contented moods. i was up til about 2:30 last night... I'd intended on going to bed earlier, but i was in a horribly lonely mood [are we noticing a trend here?] and couldnt quite convince myself that sleeping alone was a good thing... so i was laying there, feeling miserably sorry for myself...

[justification for my extreme self pity: yesterday was a hard day, a long day, and a miserable commute home -- damned idiots throwing themselves in front of trains and delaying my arrival home, making me miss my bus, making me have to wait around for the next one, then causing me to get stuck in the rain. i blame my entire miserable evening on that idiot who not only threw themselves in front of the train, but had the GALL to get STUCK under it. what a moron, i swear. so, nameless fool, the next time you want to throw yourself in front of a train, pick Amtrak. I dont take Amtrak, so it wont affect me, and you probably wont get stuck underneath the thing cuz its so heavy it'll just crush you, unlike the electric light rail, to which you are like that little wedge that holds doors open (whats that called?). of course, if you were smart enough to think of that, you wouldnt be throwing yourself in front of trains in the first place, now would you! okay... rant about idiots under trains over]

... desperately needing to smile, and laugh, and feel good about something... and just when i've about given up all hope of any gladness for the evening [i use the term evening very loosely, as at that point, it was somewhere around 1:45am i think], my army boy shows up online, and makes me smile, and laugh, and feel good :) it amazes me that he can always do that... no matter how horrible of a mood i'm in, no matter how sad i am, no matter how angry i am... theres something about him that just puts me totally and completely at ease with myself, and everything around me... and makes me feel like all is right with the world. i cant explain it. its as surprising to me as it is for anyone who knows me. i'm never at ease, about anything. ever. and the world never seems right. ever. except after talking with him.

i didnt have any trouble falling asleep after that... and i didnt have nightmares either... i slept, peacefully. i didnt even toss or turn in my sleep [i know cuz i always wake up slightly if i'm moving around in my sleep. i'm an incredibly light sleeper. its slightly annoying at times]. and i woke up with a smile :) i must have had sweet dreams, even if i dont remember them.

he's due home soon, and due to come see me soon... and i'm so nervous... not so much about seeing him, because i dont think that being together face to face is going to ruin anything... but more about the condition of my apartment. i'm rather ashamed of my crappy little hole in the wall that doesnt even feel like its really my space yet... and hes supposed to stay with me... *sigh* my living quarters are the one part of my life that i have yet to begin getting in order, and as of right this second, all my ex's crap is still in my apartment. its not so much that the place is dirty [except for the kitchen, which is funny, because thats the one room in the place that i'm the most anal about], its more that its cluttered, and cramped, and feeling very alien to me because its supposed to be my space now, only its not quite yet... and i havent had anyone over except my best friend [well and my mom, to help me do some cleaning one weekend] simply because, well, i'm ashamed of the place. and i know she's the only person i know who wouldnt judge me because of it. i know, i know, i work full time, i go to school full time, and i have a kid. i dont have time for cleaning. but you know what? it may not be bad compared to some places, but to me its abysmal, and i dont want to subject anyone else to it. so cleaning is fast becoming one of my top priorities, second only to work, school, and my kid [i guess that makes it fourth... hmm]. and i'm thinking of getting my kiddo in on the cleaning action... heck, hes 5, its about time he learned how to pick stuff up and put it away properly.

but even all that isnt really bothering me much right now... this blissfully quiet and contented state is sticking around quite nicely, even with an in class essay looming above my head tonight, and homework waiting in the wings at lunch and when i get home. i love feeling like this :) i absolutely love it :) and i've been having the most wonderful day dream all morning... but i'll leave that for a later post ;) time to get back to work.

homework, art, tribal porn, and a new computer, oh my!

well, i'd tell you about my weekend... but i really dont know what to say... saturday was all chores and homework. literally. my only break from the two of those things was my trip down to mc donald's to grab some quick food, and later my trip to the gas station down the street to buy smokes (as i was running dangerously low). it rained all day saturday, and it was absolutely wonderful. i love rain. i'm sure i've said that before... but oh well. you get to see me say it again :P

sunday was spent on Stanford (Stanfurd) campus. i have an intense hatred toward Stanford, as both my father and myself are UC Berkeley employees. call it school spirit if you will, but i'm patriotic towards my place of employment. even if it is only because i practically grew up on campus, and they write my paychecks. anyway... i digress.

Stanford, as much as i hate them, has a wonderful art museum. a FREE art museum. and to a starving (not literally, but you know what i mean) student, anything free is automatically very very awesome. but on top of it being free, they've got an amazing Rodin exhibit going on, complete with a replica of "the gates of hell" and a whole wing full of his bronze sculptures. they also have a great middle eastern art wing (complete with egyptian mummy in sarcophagus), and two sections of native american art. we went through the WHOLE museum. and i only really had two problems with the place. 1) typos on the information plaques and 2) some of the pieces were dispursed rather randomly (for example, we found a Rodin piece of two ballet dancers mixed in with the Chinese art). we also went to the Stanford Mosoleum (or however you spell that), and the "angel of grief" (i think thats what its called... sorry... ADD... cant remember the name of the thing properly) which is one of the most beautiful statues i've ever seen.

After that, we went to the other side of the campus, and visited this outdoor tribal art display thing (yes, i cant remember the name of that EITHER... thank you... *sigh*). it was full of carvings in stone and wood that were done by tribal artists from new guinea, and it was stunning. the stone carvings made you feel like you were deep in a tropical forest (eventhough the place was covered in pine needles... hehe), and the wooden carvings made you feel as if you were in one of the spirit houses that were talked about on the informational plaques scattered around the place. the intricacy of the carvings blew me away (as someone who's done a little bit of carving herself...), and what they depicted... wow. there was one of these "spirit post" things that i couldnt help but laughing at though... every single creature on the thing was fukking another creature on it... or eating another creature on it, and in some cases, you couldnt tell the difference. alligators, boars, people, monkey looking things... all screwing. lol. i'm sure it has some sort of deep spiritual meaning, but with my dirty mind... well... all i could think was "orgy!!" LOL. i also found my perfect man in there too... maybe i'll figure out how to post pictures on this thing, and add that at some point. y'all will have a good laugh :P after that we wandered around to see some of the random works of art they have in front of their buildings... one was supposed to be a bronze sculpture of a unicorn... but... all it looked like was an abstracted fish... um yeah. I guess thats Stanford for ya. lol.

I was supposed to do homework after i got back from my trip into enemy territory... but i didnt. i swear we must have walked like 4 or 5 miles, and i was just too tired and sore to be able to address my geography, or my english. i guess i'll just do the geography while i'm in the lecture class tonight, and i'll do my english tonight when i get home, or at lunch tomorrow or something. AH! note to self: on the way to class tonight, buy blue books for the in-class essay tomorrow in english!

(hmmm it appears i HAVE told you about my weekend now... um... ignore previous statement about not knowing what to say)

OH! happy news... this morning i finally ordered my new laptop! i was sposed to do it like, 3 weeks ago, but well... i never got around to it, and then last night i noticed that dell prices had fallen through the floor (base model price for a laptop $699... whoa) so i went in and customized the heck outta one (turning said 699 into 1100 haha), and ordered it this morning. i checked on the order this afternoon (to make sure my card had gone through... erm... yes, i needed to check... shut up!), and :O they're building it now! *grins an insanely huge grin* i will have it in time to do all my geography field reports on CDRW! *bounces up and down happily*

okay... is it sad that i'm so excited about being able to do field reports on CDRW? or am i completely justified to be happy to finally own a computer that can handle my graphics software? (Corel will NOT run on the POS i have for a doorstop at home...-- glossary -- POS = piece of shit. doorstop = laptop that is so outdated and obsolete that all its good for is holding open a door) anyway... fun fun stuff for me, cuz the new laptop will have a battery that holds its charge for longer than 15 minutes (yes really... i told you... doorstop), and i can actually take it on the train to work with me, and do my homework THERE :D *bounces up and down summore* [alright, stop imagining that i'm not wearing a shirt... jeez... y'all are not my geography teacher, dont act like him! LOL]

anyway... um... i should like... um... work... or something... so... talk to y'all later!

Strike! Strike!!

it has finally happened. the elevators have gone on strike.

this morning, for the first time in 3 years (as long as i've been here), BOTH elevators are broken. i, for one, am not going to be crossing that picket line.

elevators of the EECS department unite! one in the building across the street has joined the strike as well!

i'm thinking of having my union support their endeavor... but i dont think it will get past committee, because everyone will be too busy trying to decide what color the picket signs should be (are they in aural harmony with the carrier? is this picket line contrary to a fung shui principle? wait wait, in {insert archaic extinct tribal culture name here} that color signifies the presence of evil spirits! we cant use THAT...).

speaking of my union... they are now debating the following: a) whether or not to have fortune cookies made to hand out at the next rally. b) what the messages inside those fortune cookies should be. note: the decision about buying the fortune cookies has not yet been made, but the debate about the included messages is the one that is going full force *DOH!*

ahhhh mondays... LOL. hope yours is going better.

what was i going to say again?

well i knew what i was going to write here... but in the time it took to bring up notepad (i type all my posts in notepad because a) blogger has a nasty tendency to eat my posts when i try to post them and b) i dont like how word tries to capitalize my lower cases, and fix my grammar -- word does not account for style, i swear) i seem to have forgotten what i wanted to say. maybe if i ramble on for a little bit i'll remember.

this seems to be a night for totally changing my mind. i was hungry. so i made [microwaved] dinner. now that its sitting in front of me, i seem to have lost my appetite. which is odd, cuz i know my blood sugar has fallen through the floor.

i cant seem to find anything good on television, to the point that i've resorted to watching "the women's entertainment channel" which is very non-typical for me.

and now i still cant remember what i wanted to write. i have a feeling it was kind of important, but i still cant put my finger on exactly what it was, so i guess i'll just give up for now and try it again later.

schitzophrenic ramblings [indeed they are]

wow... i've been trying to write this post for an hour and a half, and keep coming up with abso-freakin nothin [lame eh?].

i guess the problem is that i'm not really all here today [okay, so i'm never really all here, but i mean more-so than normal, seen?]. i couldnt sleep last night [well thats not accurate either. i could have slept, and in fact i did eventually, but i didnt really want to] and so was up way too late [late enough that it was morning again before i fell asleep in front of my computer waiting to see if army boy was going to make it back from "i got booted off yahoo" land]. as a result, i called in to work sick [indeed, i wasnt actually "sick" per se, but i felt like crap anyway and just wanted to go back to sleep] and didnt end up coming in til like, noon [noon was a completely accurate representation of when i got here, when i started working is a totally different story].

so today is a "sit at my desk and mess around on the computer" day [i have many of these] where i basically dont do anything except be here to answer the phone and respond to any "urgent" [urgent for the sender, cuz frankly, nothing here is urgent to me... i dont give a shit anymore] emails. and i might not even answer the emails [okay, i will, but only out of my noble sense of duty, and having nothing better to do].

i really just want to go back home [which i could do if i wanted to waste my vacation leave] and go to sleep [which i probably wouldnt end up doing anyway], but the idea of sleeping alone [as usual, again, blah] is just way too much for me to bear [seriously. i lose more sleep that way than any other]. and i do mean just sleeping. i'm not talking about some desire to get fukt or anything like that [although, i wouldnt mind that either], i really honestly mean i want someone to sleep next to. theres just something so comforting about feeling someone's chest against your back as you slowly fall into a deep peaceful sleep [and i dont fall into deep peaceful sleeps any other way]. i guess it makes me feel safe [feeling safe is very important to me]. and i dont have nightmares [usually] if someone's holding me while i sleep [such a rare thing... so i just suffer through the nightmares].

what are the nightmares about? [yes, i knew someone would wonder, so i'm attempting to answer... now] the thing about that is, i dont know. i dont remember them [except for a choice few, but i am NOT sharing those because a) i dont feel like reliving them right now, and b) they were horrible enough that just reading about them would give YOU nightmares]. i just wake up in this intense state of terror and sadness [yes, at the same time. dont ask me how THAT works, i'm no psych major], typically on the verge of tears. sometimes i feel as if i need to get away from something [no, i dont know what], or to escape somehow [no, i dont know how either].

sometimes i have good dreams [very good dreams even], but thats an extremely rare thing [although, i've been having recurring good dreams lately, which is a nice change of pace]. i love having good dreams... i wish i had more of them [especially the recurring ones that i've been having lately]. usually if i have good dreams, its if i'm sleeping while the sun is up [early morning, or the middle of the afternoon]. i just dont dream well at night [or sleep well, as a result]. i think it might have something to do with it being dark [lack of vitamin D maybe?] or the fact that its harder for me to be alone at night than it is during the day [theres just something about how peaceful night is that makes me really really want to share it with someone].

and then sometimes [even more rarely than the good dreams] i have strange dreams that dont scare me, but arent good either [read: weird fukt up dreams that you never seem to forget, and think about on a regular basis because you're still trying to figure out what the fuk they meant]. the last one of those i had was... well it was funny i suppose [at least thats what people said when i told them about it], but in a dark kinda way. i dreamt i was giving birth to something [yes, someTHING, as in, not a baby] in an old run down gas station garage, while strapped to the hydraulic lift, and surrounded by men dressed in mechanics overalls, with surgical masks and caps, who were holding various automotive tools [alright, so i'm insane. thats what the dream means right? that i'm beyond fukt up eh? gee thanx for agreeing with me]. i wrote about that dream for an english essay [goddamned stupid fukkin english essays, i hate those friggin things], and i saw the prof's face as he was reading over it real quick after i turned it in... i've never seen someone look so shocked before [okay, so i have, but it sounds better if i say that i havent].

so yeah... sleep for me is generally a difficult thing [not entirely surprising, given the above bit about my dreams].

anyway, enough of my schitzophrenic ramblings [yeah, enough already], i'm gonna go wander out for a ciggy and waste some more time [slacker!].

cruel b*tch with a wicked sense of humor

[repost from earlier today... thank you RJ for sending it to me... and thank you blogger *sarcasm* for eating it in the first place]

ah... i've been remiss in posting a daily little blurb... and the last one i posted wasnt even up to my normal caliber, just a cut and paste of quiz results. fun quiz results, but still... not up to my normal standard of inane ramblings.

so... what have i been up to? oh, you think i've actually been doing work for once? haha. so wrong. i spent yesterday researching a legal matter, then staying up way too late because, well, i wasnt in the mood for sleep. *ahem* *blush*

anyway... class yesterday weirded me out just a little bit... erm... lemme start somewhere else. okay. so you know, all my life i've been hearing the stories about professors seducing their students, and exchanging sex for a better (or passing) grade... well. i'm not saying that happened to me. definitely not! but, i always thought that kind of thing was a lot more fiction than it was fact... until last night. I get to class early. I always do. i'm off work at 5:30, and class doesnt start til 6:30, and its only a 15 minute walk from my office. so i showed up early as usual. and the prof was there earlier than usual, and we got into a conversation about grants to write a decent geography text book. the picture of innocence right? right. except for one thing. the whole time he was talking to me, he never looked at my face ONCE. and i'm not talking about the whole looking in a completely opposite direction kinda thing. i'm talking about the staring directly at my chest and undressing it with his eyes kinda thing. i'm not entirely unaccustomed to that action, but i AM unaccustomed to that kind of blatant sexual tension being delivered by MY TEACHER (well, there was that once in high school... but... well nevermind. thats another story).

now, i like to be appreciated just as much as the next girl. more so even. but... there is something entirely disconcerting about a late 40's married professor undressing you with his eyes while you're having a detailed technical conversation about proposals and govt spending habits. especially when this is someone that you are relying on to teach you, and give you a fair grade. even if theres no ACTUAL intimidation, you feel intimidated. you get nervous. you wonder, if you say something, will he fail you? you wonder, if you dont say something, and you play into it, will he give you a better grade? you wonder, if you can ignore it, and pretend that hes not doing it, can you earn your grade on your own merit? well... lets just say thats an extremely uncomfortable place to be in...

me well, coward that i am, pretended to ignore it, but played into it just a little bit... smiling too much, laughing just slightly too loudly, shifting my stance just enough to make the right places jiggle a teensy bit, playing with my hair... not quite flirting mind you, but, definitely acting like a woman... he was so distracted that he kept talking even once class was supposed to have started. haha.

yes, i am a cruel bitch with a wicked sense of humor. but i figure, if he was gonna make me uncomfortable, i might as well return the favor. we'll see if he pulls that kinda thing again when i show up on monday in something a little more revealing.

gawd, i am a horrible horrible person... messing with a prof's head like that... i have no intention whatsoever of going anywhere near the guy... i mean... PLEASE! 40something, boring, bookish, very very overweight, married guy who probably doesnt get any from his wife anymore so imagines feeling up his students while hes talking to them... YUK. as long as hes just looking tho, i'm gonna use it to my advantage if i can. if hes smart (which he appears to be, being a teacher and all) look is all he'll try to do. any more than that, and i'm screaming bloody murder to the college board. i dont need an A in geography THAT bad. LOL.

yes... yes... i am in a rather wickedly evil mood today... hmmm... i wonder how that happened *evil grin*

what the...

okay... now i'm a little ticked off... my wonderful rant about my pervacious teacher has magically disappeared off my blog...

i can only hope that it might one day reappear... but... well... blogger is having issues apparently.

so, in the mean time, if anyone comes across it, please email it to me, or something. i LIKED that post!

my office chair is vibrating...

this vibrating is driving me insane. almost literally. demolition of the building next door is still going on, and right now they're jackhammering through bedrock and concrete to 3 floors deep. yes. 3 floors deep. and my entire office is acting like a bowl of jello on a "magic fingers" bed. the noise doesnt bother me. i keep the alt. rock cranked up loud anyway. its this constant movement. its making me sick to my stomach, and giving me a headache like you wouldnt believe. and i cant concentrate when every other word i type has a typo because the keyboard is shaking under my hands, and my chair is moving around a little of its own accord, and the computer screen keeps jiggling making me dizzy. it feels almost like vertigo... this sickening dizziness... and my muscles dont know what to make of it either... they're tensed and tight like iron bars, making my joints ache and ache...

and you thought this was gonna be a sexy post. hah. take that.

this damned vibrating creeps up through the floor, into your feet, and travels the length of your body through your bones, making your teeth click together just ever so slightly, and causing your eardrums to rattle. yes, its making my eardrums rattle in my head. it HURTS, and sounds like a deep rumble. the rumble resonates throughout your being. and then the room around you follows suit and begins to tremble... and doesnt stop for HOURS.

dont these idiots (the people in charge of the construction project) give a shit that they are going to cause me an aneurism or something?? obviously not...

i'm a seductive pervert!!

Take the quiz: "What Kind of Pervert are You?"

The Seductive Pervert
The Seductive Pervert: You are The Seductive Pervert, you don't have to try! You use only your body and sexual ways to lure someone in an endless dream of sexual fantasies. Although you may use toys, you have your desires, you seem to know what gets to them, you even know their soft spots, woah, wouldn't matter if they had first met you or not! Your ways are unbelievable and quite sensual, you could probably lay anyone you wanted with the way you speak, move, or just motion. Just don't test your abilities on yourself, you might find yourself attracted to even your own body. Let's try attracting another person instead. Hehe!

soaking, sopping, dripping wet...

oh. my. god.

when it rains, it RAINS doesnt it? none of that drizzle stuff for us, noooooooooo... just buckets and buckets of rain, and 40mph winds... jeezus fukkin christ. i havent been this soaked in years! and dont you dare tell me i should have brought an umbrella, cuz i did! umbrella AND a rain coat, and i'm STILL soaked through! oh what? i'm supposed to WEAR the raincoat? and OPEN the umbrella? well gosh, wish ya'd told me that before i left for work!! :P just kidding, i did all that too, and i'm all wet anyway. in 40mph winds, it really doesnt much matter what rain protection gear you've got... ya know?

and do you have any idea how friggin hard it is to smoke a cigarette in a torrential downpour? pretty damned hard, lemme tell ya. i'm surprised the danged thing stayed lit! haha. a sign from above that i should quit maybe? eh. yeah. we all know i should. including me. but thats not happening any time soon.

do i sound bitter? well, i'm not actually. i love the rain. absolutely LOVE it. what i dont love, is having to ride a bus, then a train, and then sit for hours at my desk while sopping wet. i'm more than happy to go for long walks in the rain, and get completely drenched, as long as i can go home when i'm done, and change into something warm and dry... or better yet, just strip and snuggle under a soft warm blanket *wink wink* yes... guess what i'm doing when i get home. hehe.

ah well... back to work... i'm actually accomplishing stuff today [shocking, i know].

for those of you who are just as wet as i am... well... hopefully its for a better reason!! LOL.

okay... EW!

as you can tell from the title of this post, you all may find this disgusting, but i had to rant about it a bit anyway. i appologize in advance wholeheartedly for any stomach upset this may cause you.

now, i dont drive, so to get to and from work and school i typically take the bus. at night, i have to transfer busses in downtown oakland... and tonight, like every night, i was walking the two blocks between my bus stops, when i saw something that totally grossed me out, not like every night. what? well... let me tell the story properly.
i was walking the two blocks to my next bus, and i passed by another bus stop... this one had one of those covered kiosk things, with benches in it... plexiglass windows all around... and inside the kiosk thing, were two people. one was pressed up against the glass (their back against it), and the other was leaning forward over the first one... seemingly pushing them against the glass. at first, i wasnt exactly sure what was going on... and then i realized that the person pressed up against the glass was a woman, and she had her shirt open... and the person pressing her against the glass was a guy... and then it dawned on me... EW. i was seeing a prostitute give a titty fuk in a bus stop kiosk!!! EW EW EW EW!!! lets just say i'm scarred for life... cuz neither one was attractive at all, in fact, the hooker looked homeless, and the guy didnt look much better off than that...

UGH *shudder* just one more reason i hate living in a big metropolitan area, and one more reason i need to learn to drive. NASTY.

Office Space transubstantiated

why is it that i never want to do what i need to do when i need to do it? why is it that i only ever want to do what i need to do when i'm supposed to be doing something else?

example: i'm at home this weekend, banging my head on my keyboard, trying to write an essay for english. i dont want to do the essay, i cant STAND the essay topic (the myth is the public dream, the dream is the private myth -- explain and support with examples and analyses of your own dreams), and i cant seem to get past 2 pages, no matter how many pages i actually end up writing. but, i can clearly and happily think about work, and all the things i need to do monday morning (today). now that i'm at work however, all i can manage to think about is that stupid essay, and the angles that i should have taken with it, and i can NOT, not even to save my own life, focus on the work i am supposed to be doing right now.

i guess the explanation is simple enough... ADD strikes again. its easy to blame it on a mental disorder, but unfortunately i'm not content with that cop-out. i am an adult, i am responsible, i should be able to enforce some self discipline in my own life, and my own thought patterns. key word there: should.

i have spent the first 2 hours of being at work as such: getting breakfast, going for a smoke, finding lyrics to a song, posting lyrics to a song on my blog, talking briefly with my boss about something thats way over my head at work and shoving it off onto her desk, having another smoke, and writing a post for my blog. um. yeah.

this is not the normal me, although it has been the most prevalent me over the past few weeks. normally, i work nonstop, except for the occasional IM from a friend or my army boy, and actually get things accomplished. lately, i've done virtually nothing. okay, so almost literally nothing, at work. i deal with the emergencies, i answer my phone, i respond to my email, and i might pay some of the invoices sitting in my pending folders... but really? i do nothing all day. and i cant bring myself to do more than that. the strange thing is, the less i do, the higher the respect people give me.

what happened, was i magically transported into Office Space? funny thing is, i can see my boss saying: ummmmmmm yeah... did you get the memo about the TPS reports? (even tho shes a chick and a pretty one at that). we need one of those consultants to come in so that i can tell them how fukt up this place is, and get it fixed, as well as getting all this work (that i'm never going to do) off my desk. blah. anyway, i guess i should go at least LOOK busy... *shrug*

i'll try to post something funny later... funny posts are generally more interesting anyway.

boulevard of broken dreams

okay, i've got to plug the new Green Day album, American Idiot. so far every song i've heard off this album is GREAT. especially the one that i've listed the lyrics to below. i think we all feel like this at least once in our lives, some of us feel this way more often than that. i know i feel like this constantly.

Green Day - Boulevard Of Broken Dreams

I walk a lonely road
The only one I that have ever known
Don't know were it goes
But its home and I walk alone

I walk this empty street
On the Blvd. of broken dreams
Where the city sleeps
And I'm the only one and I walk alone

My shadows the only one that walks beside me
My shallow hearts the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
Till then I'll walk alone

Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ahhh
Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ahhh

I'm walking down the line
That divides me somewhere in my mind
On the border line of the edge
And where I walk alone

Read between the lines of what's
F**ked up and every things all right
Check my vital signs to know I'm still alive
And I walk alone

I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk alone
I walk a...

My shadows the only one that walks beside me
My shallow hearts the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
Till then I'll walk alone

Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ahhh
Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ah-Ah Ahhh

I walk this empty street
On the Blvd. of broken dreams
Where the city sleeps
And I'm the only one and I walk a..

My shadows the only one that walks beside me
My shallow hearts the only thing that's beating
Sometimes I wish someone out there will find me
Till then I'll walk away!

weird things... continued

alright, so first with the LN soda chiller this afternoon...

THEN... i saw, for the first time, a cop on a [oh dude, get this] SEGWAY. yes, you read that right, a SEGWAY. i have never seen anything more lame in my entire life. i mean, we're sposed to be intimidated by cops right? well let me tell you, i was so UNintimidated that i nearly tripped walking past the guy i was laughing so hard. especially since they dont just ride the segway, they wear a HELMET while riding the segway. yes, you read that right too. a HELMET. and on the front of the segway, there is a fanny pack looking thing to carry their ticket books and things. can you see why i was laughing so hard?? but apparently this is the new thing for UCB cops... and its becoming a widely accepted trend. only god knows why, cuz i sure as heck cant figure it out.

a grasshopper in the bathroom sink???

okay... so last nite my prof keeps us late at class, and i didnt wind up getting home til after 11... closer to 11:30 really... so i drop my stuff and head to the bathroom to wash up n get outta my work clothes n stuff like that... and what do i find waiting for me in my bathroom sink?? A GRASSHOPPER!!!

oh see, now you're saying "thats not so weird, what are you freaking out about??" but you dont understand. i live in a crappy hole in the wall second floor apartment that only has two windows... one in the bedroom, and one is a huge sliding glass door to my should-be-condemned balcony. neither of those two windows had been open in days (what with me not being home much and all). there is no window in the bathroom. the closest outlet to nature in the bathroom is the teeny little fan thingy in the ceiling, and let me tell ya, the slats on that are WAY too small for a grasshopper to fit through.

so i'm standing there, staring at it, wondering how the HELL it got there... and it JUMPS at me. not an issue really, except that i was leaning in close peering at it, and it nearly landed on my face. i cant STAND stuff in my face like that. so of course i did the girly little EEEK! thing and jumped back, trying to impale myself backwards on the doorknob ... umm i dont think it left a mark... heh.

well after that i scooped the thing up in a cup and held a CD case over the top of it so it couldnt get out... and i dumped the little guy out on my balcony. i hope he finds his way down okay... he was cute, even if he did launch himself at my nose.

so that was my excitement last night... and all my excitement too. cuz after that i pretty much crashed... okay okay, so i chatted with some friends for a half hour or so, and sent an email or two... but directly after that i went to bed. oh fine, so i didnt. i watched tv for a bit too. so sue me :P i still got up for work on time this morning (shocking!!) so its all good.

oh yeah... weird sight for the day:

in the pile of snow underneath the liquid nitrogen tanks outside my building (yes, defective storage tanks leak, and create "snow" on the outside of the tanks, which flakes off and piles up underneath), someone had half buried a couple bottles of soda to keep them cold. it was just slightly strange. not overly weird, i mean, it made sense and all... but... do we really wanna take the risk of swallowing any of that LN snow??? i sure dont!

Hot Topic Alert!

okay... so i'm linking to a conversation that is taking place on another blog, that i think a fair number of you would be interested to see my views on, because i will NOT be posting them here. its a discussion about the state of our nation, the war on terror, the war on iraq, and our current prez. i've taken the less common view point... so i thought you would all be interested. go HERE to read, and join in as well if you feel like it. i think that talking about this type of thing, having an open discourse, is very important, especially with the upcoming elections.

i'll post something more personal, and more light hearted, later.

quietly romantic

this is a day for the record books people... today, i actually feel [omg, get this!] relaxed. yes! really! i'm not kidding at all! and, on top of that, i'm in one of those quietly romantic moods that is oh so girly [again, what? me? girly? since when?].

so i'm sitting here at work, listening to 80's "power balads"... hitting the replay button on Extreme "More Than Words" and Bad English "When I See You Smile", over and over and over again... um... yeah... okay, so in this one aspect i am a stereotypical chick. you have to admit tho, those two songs are the BEST love songs EVER...

but yeah... quiet romantic mood... you know those ones, where just being held would be heaven? curled up with someone, arms around eachother, just listening to each other breathe... or a long drive to nowhere, not having to talk, just enjoying being near one another... or even just going for a walk (moonlit of course), leaning against each other slightly, arms around each other's waists...

i dunno, its simple things like that that i enjoy the most, not the fancy over the top stuff. those things usually end up being more work than they are fun, and its always hard to just concentrate on the other person... which i always thought was the point. i mean, if you love someone that way, you dont care about fancy dinners, or nights out dancing, as long as you get to be with them. i think the most romantic things, the most intimate things, are the simple things. not to be cliche, but long walks on the beach do happen to fall into that catagory of simple romantic intimate things... but i'm just as happy with a long drive down the coast, or hell, even pizza and a DVD, as long as we curl up and just be together.

so anyway... yes, i am relaxed, i am feeling quietly romantic, and i'm quite content at this precise moment... except that i'd love to be doing one of those quietly romantic things i just talked about, instead of sitting at work writing about them. hehe. oh well. soon enough :)

blogging your praises

well, you [and you know who you are] said you dont deserve to have your praises sung, but i disagree. unfortunately, i cant sing, so i'll just have to blog them instead.

you are one of the most creative, talented, and passionate people i have ever known. you took something that most people would view as a hobby or an unrealizable dream, and turned it into a career, despite criticisms from your family and your bank account. you have no idea how brave that is, or how much i envy your motivations and self discipline.

you make jokes about the things i take too seriously, forcing me to laugh at them, and myself. you see the bright side of what i see dimly, and dont stop pointing it out until i see it too. you push me to think about why i believe the things i believe, and point out when i'm being judgmental. you say all the things i dont want to hear, but need to. you see me not only for who i am right now, but for who i will be, and you push me to be that better, stronger, more confident person.

i love you for all of that (and more), and i always will.

[10-14-2004 -- due to inquiry by several as to who i am talking about here, let me just say that this is directed towards one of my best friends in the world, and that this one little post doesnt even come close to saying as much as i'd really like to about him]

"if i can" is a scary phrase

wow... did i ever just fall off the manic wagon HARD.

i guess theres just something about someone telling you "a mortar just hit the FOB and i have to go report in. i'll try to get back if i can" before they log off thats enough to ruin any good mood. and you know, its not the mortar part thats scary. its the "if i can" part thats scary. you start thinking about all the reasons that he might not be able to... and believe me, none of them are pretty.

its times like these that i curse my overactive imagination, and wish i was a boring un-creative person who never suffered the from the what-ifs. those what-ifs will be the death of me. i'll get so worked up over one of them some day that i'll give myself a heart attack, and keel over in the middle of the street, or at my desk, or some other inconvenient place. but yeah... anyway...

i know i havent talked much about my army boy... actually... i think i've only mentioned him once here, and then only in passing... and you know what? y'all can just keep wondering for now, cuz i havent a clue what he'd think if i started plastering stuff about him all over the internet. I know he doesnt read this blog, he doesnt have time to, but eventually he might, and i really dont wanna embarass anyone here, so... i'll just give ya a few choice tid bits...

hes sweet, funny, absolutely adorable, kind, caring, generous, responsible, and the best thing thats ever happened to me, even if he is stuck in the desert right now, dodging mortars. i have never met anyone [okay, so technically i havent met him yet either, face to face anyway, but you all know what i mean] that i respect, admire, or trust more than him. i have never met anyone who has the power to change me from tears to laughter in the space of 5 minutes except for him. no one makes me smile more. no one makes me feel more special. no one makes me feel more loved. and i cannot wait til he's home, and i can give him all the kisses he deserves for being such an angel to me.

you know, its funny, but just talking about him puts me in a little bit of a better mood... man, i wish he read this thing, i have a feeling he'd like to know that :)

anyway, its about time for me to get out of here... i'm not going to class tonite cuz well, i didnt write the paper (i didnt flake on it completely, i just couldnt finish it cuz my stupid wrist gave out) that i was supposed to turn in... its okay, its just a rough draft, i wasnt stupid enough to flub an actual honest to goodness essay!... and well so since i dont have the rough draft done, its kind of pointless for me to go to a class where we're just going to spend 3 hrs discussing the rough draft that i didnt finish. um. yeah.

so imma go home, and try not to worry too much, and maybe wash some dishes, or treat myself to a vanilla bubble bath by candle light, or maybe both, and then try to get some sleep. i need sleep... god i need sleep... i've got the dark circle thing going on underneath my eyes, EW.

someone to make me wake up

well i was late to work AGAIN today... it seems no matter what i do, its impossible for me to get here on time. if i get up on time, the bus is late, or the train has mechanical problems. of course, getting up on time is the hardest thing for me to do. i'm sleep deprived, and i know it. most nights i dont manage to get to sleep until after 2 or 3 in the morning. that is something i have to work on, i know. but with these night classes, i dont get home til 11 some nights, and its HARD to shut my mind down! not to mention i've never really been good at the whole sleep thing in the first place. insomniac, thats me. i guess that maybe it just feels like a waste of time, that and i have a tendency towards nightmares... i just dont WANT to sleep. of course, i realize that this is a bad thing, that i NEED to sleep, and i need more than just 3 or 4 hours a night, but a lot of the time it just doesnt seem to matter. my body is so used to my fukt up sleep schedule, that i cant seem to break the cycle. and i've tried just about everything to break the cycle. i've tried staying up all night to try and force myself to be tired enough to sleep when i got home the next day. i've tried drinking to make myself sleepy. i've tried sleeping pills, and mixing sleeping pills with antihistamines. i've tried turning off anything that makes noise and forcing myself to lie still (which REALLY doesnt work). i've tried leaving the tv on, or the radio. i've tried to sleep in my bed. i've tried to sleep on my couch. i've tried sleep on the floor for crying out loud! and you know what? NOTHING WORKS.

so once i finally fall asleep, its a bitch and a half for me to wake up again... which means i hit the snooze button on my alarm clock a half million times, or even just flat out reset the thing. i've even called in sick to work just because i couldnt wake up, and i knew there was no way i was going to make it to the office before noon.

so what does my boss do? she emails me, asking me to make my hours EARLIER. LMAO. that so fixes the problem doesnt it. i cant get here by 9 most days, what makes her think that i'm going to be able to get here by 8? hahahaha. oh fukkin well. i'm just gonna have to figure out a way to make myself get up in the morning, no matter how tired i am. it would really help if i had someone around to kick me outta bed or something, someone to drag me into the shower and MAKE me wake up... but i dont have that... *sigh* maybe i need like, 3 or 4 alarm clocks scattered randomly throughout my apartment and have them go off at 1 minute intervals...

hmmm this is an interesting idea... one by my bed, one in the living room, one in the kitchen, one in the bathroom... that way, i have to get up and walk around, and actually wake up... and by the time i've turned off the last one, i'm right there by the shower anyway...so why not get into it if i'm already right there? ah! i think i've figured it out! now all i need to do is go get 3 more alarm clocks. LOL. yeah like thats gonna happen.

anyway... i should really stop typing cuz i did something to my wrist and now it doesnt wanna work right (dont ask, cuz i have no idea what i did), and it hurts to do stuff like type and write, and turn door knobs. (i'm guessing this is what happens when one handwrites 6 or 7 pages worth of essay in less than 3 hrs... but i'm not sure so dont quote me)

when elevators forget how to count

once again the elevators in my building are on the fritz. mind you, this is not breaking news, nor is it surprising by any means. ever since they started tearing down the building next door, they blocked off the stairs that lead to the rest of campus, so all that traffic has been funneled through my building, and into our poor old elevators. needless to say, the strain on them has been dehabilitating. over the past few months, at least one of them has been broken half of the time.

now however, the elevators have been developing severe dementia.

example number one:
you get on the elevator on the second floor, intending to go down one floor (this is necessary as there are no stairs between the second floor and the first floor mezzanine -- its not just that we're lazy, honest). the elevator understands that you want to go down, and has the down arrow lit as confirmation. once you press the button, and the door closes, the elevator immediately FORGETS that it had agreed to take you down, and proceeds to take you UP to the fourth floor before even considering letting you out. then, and only then, does it remember that it was supposed to go down. upon this realization, the doors SLAM shut, and you plummet down to the floor you originally requested, passing up any persons waiting for a down elevator on the way.

example number two:
you get on the elevator on the mezzanine, intending to go up one floor (again, necessary, as mentioned above). the elevator understands that you want to go up, and has the up arrow lit as confirmation. once you press the button and the door closes, the elevator immediately becomes confused about what floor its actually on, and defaults to thinking that its in the basement!! (this is two floors lower than you actually are). so, thinking its in the basement, it takes you up four floors, to what it THINKS is the second floor, but is ACTUALLY the FOURTH floor. when it goes to let you out, it suddenly regains its bearings, and slams the doors shut to take you back DOWN to the second floor.

example number three:
you get on the elevator, press the button, and nothing happens. for TEN minutes. you wait patiently, knowing its an old elevator, but eventually you start to get scared. if the door is taking this long to close, will it ever open again when its time for you to get out? but then suddenly the door does start to close... 1/4... 1/3... 1/2... SLAM! all the way. and thats when you panic. you think its never going to open again! and when you finally get to your floor, your fears are reinforced... the door creaks, but does not move. you wait, growing more and more claustrophobic as the seconds crawl by. eventually, the door starts to move, it starts to open... 1/4... 1/3... 1/2... SLAM!! all the way open. you can finally breathe again.

these elevator antics have encouraged me to take the stairs whenever possible... even if i have to go down a floor before i can go up a floor (as is the case if i want to go from the mezzanine to the second floor... i have to take the stairs down to the first floor, and from there take a separate staircase up to the second floor... 6 flights of stairs all together).

i'm thinking of starting a petition to have the elevators put on dementia medication, as their delusional states are getting worse, and worse, as time goes by. i'm sure at least the east elevator should go on stress leave, but i dont think the elevators union has negotiated a new contract that allows for that yet.

(yes i'm still manic, cant you tell? :P)

handcuffs and NIN

okay, so i didnt write anything this weekend. i was too busy catching up on all the homework i shirked last week, and i still havent really caught up, but who gives a fuk at this point. i'm on this totally awesome manic high right now and im doing everything i can to keep it.

so i woke up this morning, after only getting maybe 2 hrs sleep... and i felt... dont know how to explain it... like i wasnt a person anymore, like i was a force of nature; a hurricane or a tornado. when i got dressed, i put on a pair of jeans i havent been able to wear in years... and they look better on me now than they did then... old ripped black levi's... my favorite jeans... and immediately got into a hardcore state of mind... so i'm wearing those, harness boots with a thick heel, low cut black tank, and my favorite belt (which now wraps a full third farther around my waist than when i bought it) -- black leather with double clasp, and chromed grommets that go allllllll the way around... oh and the signature plaid flannel tied around my waist. i look like i belong in a nirvana music video or something lol.

but yeah... feeling like a hardcore force of nature puts me in another mood too... which... well... i'm taking it out by torturing my guy friends to death. lol. i know i'm cruel, but... well, they can be cruel sometimes too and what goes around comes around :P

just to give y'all an example... handcuffs come to mind, and i was just listening to NIN -- now i'm listening to blue monday's version of "orgy" *evil grin* make of that what you will *wink wink* i'm sure you get the idea. LOL.

union, we dont need no stinking union...

alright, so i realize that "them's fightin' words" but unions are not what they once were. when my grandfather was still working, and part of a union, the union was strong. when the union spoke out about something, employers had to listen, or be crippled by strikes and sick outs and work slow downs. does my union do any of that? is it a strong union? no!! its a worthless union that just makes us clericals look like complete and total morons!! i wish they didnt even exist! i wish i didnt have a union at all, at this point, and that is honestly how i feel.

i mean, get this... the union spends more time discussing which color the button they want to hand out at the next poor excuse for a rally they have than they spend discussing the important issues, like how to get us a raise, or how to get our health insurance costs decreased, or how to get the university to pay us for the time we have to take off when they close the campus over winter break. it infuriates me to no end! that and the few times they do try to talk about anything remotely serious, they refuse to accept that the university isn't going to give a rats behind about their whining. all the university cares about is the bottom line, how much what costs, and why they should shell out that kind of cash. instead, the union thinks that they can remind the university to treat its employees with respect, dignity, and a little bit of morality. come ON people. not only are we talking about a govt funded institution, but we're talking about an academic corporation!! they dont HAVE morals, and they dont give a flying fuk about respect and dignity, unless its in regards to how people treat THEM!

not to mention, the union insists on involving itself in the political agendas of every ultra liberal special interest group that it happens to come across... to the point that when you list the organizations union management is affiliated with, you find things like "liberal lesbian communist coalition" (!!!!!!! WHAT!!!!!!) and "socialist gay men unite to save the whales" (!!!!!r u shitting me?!!!!) and other ridiculous bull crap like that. you think i'm joking?? oh believe me, i wish i was.

oh yeah, and then of course theres the union trying to tell you which presidential or gubernatorial or local govt candidates to vote for. just because i happen to work in an organization which requires me to pay dues even if i wasnt a member of the union does NOT mean that i agree with the union in any way shape or form about politics. in fact, i quite feel the opposite on most topics. i am a political conservative, a registered republican (although, yes, i have issues with the current prez, and probably wont be voting for him... i think i'm gonna write in my son... he'd make a much better prez, and at 5 yrs old has a larger vocabulary too :P). my union, as most unions are, is intensely on the liberal side of the line, to the degree that they endorse (get this) GREEN PARTY candidates! can you believe it?? well... this is berkeley after all... i shouldnt be too surprised, i mean, judging by the organizations (see previous examples above) that these people are associated with, i shouldn't be surprised if they wanted to endorse someone stalin-esque! yes... lets turn america into the fallen USSR. oh THATS productive! gimme a break.

i just want a raise, and better working conditions. other than that, my job is pretty damned cush. and actually, i've heard people tell me to stop complaining about my pay scale too cuz i make more than a fair number of my friends... so maybe if the union just did something about this fukt up workload, i'd be pretty content. but no... i have a stack of emails (somewhere around 15 or 20) in my inbox from the union discussing the stupid pins for the next rally. do we have any on hand? does statewide have any on hand? can we get more? what color are they? do we want a different color? should we get a variety of colors, so people can match them to their shirts?... well you know what?

I DONT CARE WHAT COLOR THE DAMNED PIN IS BECAUSE I WONT WEAR THE FUKKER!!!

the ultimate battle: homework vs. blogging

oh if only, if only i spent as much time doing my homework as i do blogging... the problem is, of course, that i dont enjoy my homework, and i do enjoy the whole blog thing. now, i shirked class tonite, so you'd think i'd spend this time doing something productive, like washing the dishes that have been stacking up, or doing homework, or laundry, or something... but no. i'm sitting here, blogging, and watching tv. okay, so i'm not really watching tv... its just on as backround noise so that my apt doesnt feel so empty.

i guess what it comes down to is that i have a lot on my mind, and i cant seem to concentrate. not to mention i'm tired as hell, but i cant seem to sleep... i fell asleep on the train home tonite, and nearly missed my stop... but now that i'm home, and its okay for me to sleep, i cant. its so frustrating. bleh.

my dysfunctional family

okay, so my sister reads my blog, so none of this will be news to her... but replying to her comment reminded me that not a whole lot of anyone else really knows whats up with the whole family situation for me, other than my own divorce thing.

here's the run down:

my parents marriage was doomed from the beginning, in my opinion... my dad comes from a huge italian family, and my mom comes from a rather microscopic german/irish family. That should give you a clue right there.

my dad is the oldest of four children, my mother is an only child (another red flag).

both my parents are, to put it mildly, control freaks; something they have been kind enough to pass along genetically to both myself and my lil sis. we however, have the common decency to admit it, whereas my parents still insist that there is nothing abnormal about them (the third warning sign that this was a hugely bad idea).

so... i think we can see where this is going... they fought. and fought HARD. the last night my dad spent in the same house as my mother, the cops came and dragged him out because the two of them had run out of pots and pans to throw at each other, and were about to start on the knives. this was approximately when i was seven, and my sister was two. let me tell you, there is nothing more sobering as a child than watching policemen "help" your father pack his clothes, and "escort" him out of the house, all the while telling you that "everything is going to be alright." let me tell you, that particular moron of an officer couldnt have been more wrong. in fact, i knew it myself, right then and there, that nothing was going to be "alright" about my family ever again, and as such, realized that the cop was lying to me because i was a little kid and he just wanted to keep me calm. i damned near punched him in the nose! course, i was smart enough to know that wouldnt help anything, so i didnt do it... but i wanted to really badly, and still kinda do even now. its sad to think that one event can cause a child to lose all faith in adults... but that one action, by that one man in a blue uniform, did it for me. yes, we have officer so-and-so to blame for my complete distrust of all things authoritative. fortunately, that distrust has served me well over the years.

so then the fun part started... divorce proceedings.

you know, its really a horrible thing when people decide to fight over their children, with no apparent care for the child's best interests. but thats exactly what happened. they each wanted us, they each were convinced that they were the best parent, they each were so intent on winning us that they lost sight of the fact that we were living, breathing, feeling human beings, and began (i believe) to see us as objects, material things, to be taken away from the other person as punishment for all the hurt they had caused one another. and while i dont think that my sis was old enough to really notice at that point, i think it became apparent to her later on, as custody remained an issue until both of us finally passed into adulthood. dad was constantly dragging mom to court, and vice versa, because of some issue about who got to see which child more, or child support wasnt enough, or child support was too much, or whatever other thing one of them wanted to deny their children in order to get back at each other.

now, the both of them are remarried. my dad to "the ice queen" (as i like to refer to her), and my mom to "the absent minded high school teacher" (who happens to suffer from severe ADD -- imagine... a control freak married to someone with ADD... oh my god... its horrific. the house is plastered with well manicured signs and notices like "turn off the stove" and "lock the door" and a myriad of other things with the same degree of simplicity).

my dad and "the ice queen" have a son, my half brother ("the spoiled brat"), that neither of them can control because "the ice queen" has no idea how to be an effective parent, and my dad (as was the case with me and my sister as well) isnt around enough to actually make much of an impact. my mom and "the absent minded high school teacher" didnt have any children of their own (thank god!), but mom's new husband has inflicted upon her the son he had from his previous marriage (another spoiled brat, but this time in his teens, so "obnoxious idiot" seems a better title) who ALSO has ADD... thus adding to my mother's constant state of insanity. needless to say, i avoid interacting with my step-father and step-brother at all costs.

yes, i know, i have ADD as well, i should be compassionate... but REALLY. i dont forget to turn off the stove, and i dont forget to take showers, and i dont forget to lock my door. thats just ridiculous, and i dont see how anyone could possibly survive life if they cant remember to do basic things like that. it borders on stupidity, and i honestly think that they are using the medical condition as an excuse as to why they dont need to better themselves, or treat my mother with a shred of respect, and it PISSES ME OFF.

as for my interactions with "the ice queen" and "spoiled brat"... i lived with them in high school (my mother and i did NOT get along at all at that point -- control freaks usually don’t – and the result was typically huge fights of the knock-down-drag-the-twelve-year-old-out-of-the-house-and-lock-the-door kind), and it was made quite clear to me that i was to be perpetually viewed as a second class citizen. i was good for babysitting, or making dinner every now and again, and i was even allowed to have friends over as long as they didnt bother anyone or break anything. but was i actually treated like part of the family? no. it was "the ice queen's" house, and i had no rights. so once i moved out, i didnt go back for quite a long time, not even for holidays, or to visit. who can blame me? ever been treated like a stranger in your own home, by your own family? its insulting, and extremely hurtful, and serves no purpose except that you end up feeling alienated, and subsequently dont feel bad when you dont talk to those people for months on end.

i also think that "the ice queen" was intimidated because at 15/16 i had better parenting skills than she did. heck, i still do. and it drives her INSANE. my sis will back me up on this too. both my sis and i have more, and better, parenting skills than "the ice queen", and this intimidates her to the point that she whines to our father about us being "overbearing" and that theres "sibling rivalry" going on, and that we "bully" our half brother.

i'm sorry, but telling someone to please stop poking you because it hurts is NOT any of those things. it is merely a) looking out for yourself, and b) teaching the brat some fukkin manners!

i should probably point out that my half brother is 15 years younger than myself. that puts me in a rather interesting position. i'm way too much older for him to have any sort of real sibling type relationship. but i'm way too young for him to see me as someone whom he should look up to, or treat with respect. he and i do okay when its just us hanging out, cuz i'm actually pretty laid back about stuff as long as he doesnt try to pull shit with me (he knows i wont let him get away with it, so he typically doesn’t try to pull shit). but when his mom is around, things go to hell in a hand basket cuz he knows he can get away with murder. so yeah, i tend to avoid them, and "the ice queen" tends to avoid me (shes finally learning that i'm not going to like her ever, and has stopped whining to my dad that i dont have deep introspective conversations with her like she thinks i'm supposed to... like we're supposed to be friends of some stupid shit like that. lemme tell ya, that aint never gonna happen, EVER).

my dad isn’t learning quite as quickly that “the ice queen” and my sister and i will never have any sort of friendship thing going on. we treat her civilly, and that’s the best that anyone can really expect. but he finally is learning that we really really really don’t like her. this is a good thing because hes no longer torturing us by having her come along on outings with us, or forcing us to spend time with her. this weekend for example. he’s taking me, “spoiled brat”, and my son up to see my sister at college. and “the ice queen” will not be in attendance. thank god. i for one do not need that kind of stress. but for us to find out if she was coming or not, my sister had to send an email (all our communication with our dad is pretty much email) to him saying that she’d really prefer if “the ice queen” didn’t come along this time. i gotta give my sis props cuz i didn’t have the guts to say anything about it this time. maybe next time i’ll be the one to speak up and ask that she not come along, maybe not. but at least he’s finally getting the hint that we’re happy to spend time with him, as long as “the ice queen” isn’t involved.

so yeah, now that i’ve written a novel… its time for me to get outta this damned office. i’m skipping class tonite… i’m just not up to going. besides, its not like i’m missing much. everything is in the friggin book.

an honest conversation with upper management... am i hallucinating?

for those of you who bother to pay attention to whether or not I'm actually online... you'll have noticed that i didn't show up at my desk til about 10am. well, thats because as soon as i showed up for work this morning, i was immediately embroiled in another one of those management sanctioned activities that preclude the actual accomplishment of anything work related (read: staff meeting).

This was a meeting like none i've ever attended before. Management was actually HONEST with us :O they gave a clear and concise picture of what was going on, and! oh boy get this! they LISTENED to what we had to say! I have never been more pleasantly surprised about something work related before! AND omg... management basically flat out told us that, in the previous meeting we had with some of the re-org planners, we had been flat out lied to about several situations. namely the situation about the possibility of people having to reapply for their jobs -- they were specific about what levels within the organization would have to worry about that too! WOW!

well yeah, i had to share, cuz well, no one here understands how rare of an event this all was, and are thus very unappreciative of my exuberance. but you guys, i know you guys will get it :)

quiet days are too few and far between

today has been an unusually quiet day. quiet days here at work are very much too few and far between for my particular tastes. i get way more done when my phone isnt ringing off the hook with people asking me stupid questions. but theres something about quiet days that unnerve me lately as well. i start to get paranoid, wondering what horrible scandalous thing is back building while my phone isnt ringing, and my email inbox isnt filling up. are they saving it all to dump in my lap at 4pm on friday? are they waiting until i'm in the middle of a hairy project before telling me about deadlines since missed? or worse yet, is my email or phone malfunctioning, and i'm not getting the crapload of urgent messages that i should be?

yes... paranoia at its best... i know, i should just enjoy the peace and quiet, and do my best to do everything i can while i can, but thats just not the way things work around here. there is always an emergency. there is always something urgent. there is always something incalculably complex and painful. and when there isnt, well, i start to worry, because there never isnt.

its kind of like when a mom knows that her child is playing way too quietly, and visions of horrible deeds done start flashing through her mind. the "oh what is he doing that hes so quiet?" questions start running through your head, and you start imagining the worst case scenario... hes painted a picture on the bedroom wall with my lipstick... hes pulling all the tape out of his video cassettes... hes discovered how to clog the toilet using nothing but q-tips... yes, just like that.

that terror of things to be found out later is exactly what i'm feeling right now. and its not unjustified either.

the last time i had a truly quiet day, the next day every single person i work for/with showed up with a horrible emergency that they'd been sitting on for at least a week! oh my... was that ever hellish. i have yet to figure out the polite way to say "lack of planning on your part does not constitute a crisis for me" and have it actually be understood... if anyone has any ideas, let me know!

welcome to my life -- simple plan

okay, so i heard this on launch just now, and it just summed up so how i've been feeling lately that i had to post the lyrics for you guys.

Welcome to My Life
Simple Plan

Do you ever feel like breaking down?
Do you ever feel out of place,
Like some how you just don’t belong,
And no one understands you?

Do you ever want to run away?
Do you lock yourself in your room?
With the radio on turned up so loud,
That no one hears you screaming?

No, you don’t know what it’s like,
When nothing feels alright,
You don’t know what it’s like,
To be like me!

To be hurt, to feel lost,
To be left out in the dark,
To be kicked, when you’re down,
To feel like you’ve been pushed around,
To be on the edge of breaking down,
When no one’s there to save you,
No you don’t know what it’s like,
Welcome to my life

Do you want to be somebody else?
Are you sick of feeling so left out?
Are you desperate to find something more,
Before your life is over?

Are you stuck inside a world you hate?
Are you sick of everyone around?
With the big fake smiles and stupid lies,
While deep inside you’re bleeding?

No you don’t know what it’s like,
When nothing feels alright,
You don’t know what it’s like,
To be like me!

To be hurt, to feel lost,
To be left out in the dark,
To be kicked, when you’re down,
To feel like you’ve been pushed around,
To be on the edge of breaking down,
When no one’s there to save you,
No you don’t know what it’s like,
Welcome to my life

No one ever lies straight to your face!
No one ever stabs you in the back!
You might think I’m happy,
But I’m not gonna be okay!

Everybody always gave you what you wanted!
You never had to work, it was always there!
You don’t know what it’s like (what it’s like)…

To be hurt, to feel lost,
To be left out in the dark,
To be kicked, when you’re down,
To feel like you’ve been pushed around,

To be on the edge of breaking down,
When no one’s there to save you,
No you don’t know what it’s like,

To be hurt, to feel lost,
To be left out in the dark,
To be kicked, when you’re down,
To feel like you’ve been pushed around,
To be on the edge of breaking down,
When no one’s there to save you,
No you don’t know what it’s like,
Welcome to my life

Welcome to my life!
Welcome to my life!